‘Pure maths in danger of extinction’
The West African Examination Council (WAEC) recently released the results of the West African Senior School Certificate Examination for private candidates with over 70 per cent failure in mathematics. Most students tend to dislike mathematics as a subject because teachers fail to motivate them and emphasize the importance and utility of the mathematics concepts they […]
The West African Examination Council (WAEC) recently released the results of the West African Senior School Certificate Examination for private candidates with over 70 per cent failure in mathematics.
Most students tend to dislike mathematics as a subject because teachers fail to motivate them and emphasize the importance and utility of the mathematics concepts they teach.
The 2018 International Day for Mathematics, tagged ‘Mathematics the Beautiful Bride’, was recently marked with the aim of creating awareness on the importance of maths on everyday life.
Speaking at the event in Abuja, Director of the National Mathematical Centre (NMC), Professor Stephen Onah, said students struggled with maths or failed it because of poor teaching methods adopted in classrooms and the attitudes of the student towards the subject.
He said maths phobia among students made them to hate the subject or despise it.
“The attitude of students towards the subject has been a very poor one. It’s like when you have a good teacher, and like when you drag a horse to the river you may not be able to force him drink, students maybe there but if their attitude to the subject is bad whatever the teacher does may not have desired impact,” he said.
Another reason, according to him, is inadequacy of qualified teachers noting that, “If you go to secondary schools today and take a sample, you will discover that less than 40 per cent of the teachers are truly in mathematics and this has been a major problem.”
He called on authorities to give confidence to teachers through motivation.
The director said Pure Mathematics was threatened and was in danger of extinction adding that effort should be made to resuscitate it.
He said evolution of mathematics education in Nigeria at the university level since 1958 has revealed that Pure Mathematics courses have been shrinking in emphasis and coverage from first generation universities to the most recently established.
“The unfortunate trend today is that most young lecturers are not interested in Pure Mathematics, thereby leading to a situation where older professors are retiring without commensurate replacement,” he said.
While noting that students’ inclinations were shifting, the don said that universities’ curriculum in mathematics have remained largely non-responsive to trends in today’s competitive and knowledge driven economy.
“Every aspect of mathematics derived its root from Pure Mathematics so there is need for us to focus to encourage our young ones,” he added.
The Minister of Education, Malam Adamu Adamu, in his remark said mathematics was not only a specialized subject but an essential tool to enable people understand the world around them.
Represented by Deputy Director in charge Polytechnics, Anwa Arua, he said the activities at the event will widen students’ horizons and expose them to both specialised and broad knowledge for a more balanced, whole-person development.
“We hope children coming through our education system will not only be effective learners at school but will remain critical, reflective and independent thinkers after they leave school,” he said.
The Secretary General, Nigerian National Commission for UNESCO, Kehinde Ayotodun, said the event was put together to promote teaching and learning of mathematics in Nigeria and to remove the phobia of the subject among students, especially the girl child.
He said Nigeria should improve the teaching and learning of maths because it “has only few professors of Algebra and we want to have more because it is only when you have what it takes that you can teach others.”